


Choosing

by Astro_Gobo



Series: The New Jedi Order [1]
Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-16
Updated: 2016-12-16
Packaged: 2018-09-09 01:19:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,929
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8870164
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Astro_Gobo/pseuds/Astro_Gobo
Summary: After the second Galactic Civil war finishes, Rey and a returned-to-the-sorta-light-side Ben choose their Padawans. Takes place five years after TFA. Reylo is not prominent, but it's implied.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This takes place under the presumption that Rey is Poe Dameron's sister. The characters of Kyra and Wedge are my original invention. This work is in a way background for the rest of my sequel trilogy fanfiction.

“Younglings!” The Jedi Grand Master Luke Skywalker was standing at the front of the room, addressing a group of fifteen younglings of around eight years of age. They all knew, tomorrow, they would be chosen by their masters. Today, however, there was no time to think of that. They had to work on developing lightsaber techniques that would work well with their style and build. 

“Younglings!” the master said again. Finally, the room fell into order. The excited chattering had stopped. “I would like to bring in two guests. Two Jedi Masters. They will be the first to tell me their choices tomorrow. They have requested I not share their names, as they wish you to know them as people first, rather than as what the Holonet has made them into.” At this the younglings looked around at each other, bristling with excitement. Two Jedi Masters! In the past, they had only been visited by Knights! And two of the younglings will become the Masters’ padawans! Skywalker continued, “They are going to be choosing first because their padawans will be trained differently from the others. They will be trained to work together. Every Jedi has a partner they work with on nearly every mission. Normally this partnership is master and padawan, or former padawan. In this case, it is master and former padawan, but they have a far stronger bond in friendship. So, they will train their padawans together, and train them to be partners to each other when they become full knights.” This was highly unusual. Who were these Jedi, who Grand Master Skywalker was clearly so willing to bend the Code for? Then, their questions were partly answered. Into the room entered two human Jedi, one male, one female. The female had long brown hair, tied behind her head in three buns, and looked to be no more than 25 years old. The male had shoulder-length black hair, and appeared to be in his early to mid-thirties. 

“Thank you for that introduction, Master Skywalker,” the female Jedi said. _Master_ Skywalker? Everyone knew to call him by his full title of Grand Master! But, to the younglings’ surprise, the great Jedi made no attempt to correct her.  
“These two are some of the greatest students I’ve ever trained--”  
“Except _he_ wasn’t _your_ student,” said the female, jabbing her thumb at the male.  
“Right, well, you know what I mean. You two are some of the greatest students I’ve had in the Academy.” The younglings were looking around at each other, shocked! How could this girl, seeming to be barely old enough to be a Jedi Knight, have the audacity to interrupt the Grand Master of the Order? “Anyway, as I was saying, younglings, these two are some of the greatest duelists that have ever come to the Academy. You would all do well to learn from them. They each also have very unique and individual lightsabers. Which.. No, perhaps we should save that until later. Anyway, split up into your practice groups, and they’ll walk around, advising you and observing who would suit them each best as a padawan.”

As always, there was one extra person. Normally they would be in a group of three, but this time was different. The extra person was a human girl, with waist-length blonde hair tied behind her head in a braid. The female Jedi walked up to her, as she was about to ask a group if she could join them. “You can spar with me if you want,” said the Master.  
“Sure,” replied the girl.  
“What’s your name?”  
“Kyra,”  
The master Force-pulled a spare training saber from the container at the front of the classroom, activated it, and asked, “Have you typically been training with two or one saber, Kyra?”  
“One, normally.”  
“I think you would be best suited for two. There’s a technique I use where... Why don’t I just show you? It would be way easier.” With another “sure” from Kyla, the master pulled another training saber, this one with a crossguard hilt, from the container. “Which is your dominant hand?” asked the master.  
“My right.”  
“Well, you would hold this one,” gesturing with the non-crossguard lightsaber, “in your left hand, so the blade would be parallel to your arm, and use that for blocking blows while attacking with this one,” this time gesturing with the crossguard saber, “in your right hand. Got it? Ok, now try to deflect my attacks,” she finished, pulling two more sabers from the training container. 

Quickly, Kyra realized that this jedi, no matter her apparent young age, was formidable in combat. She moved quickly and gracefully, striking where you would least expect it. Somehow, Kyra managed to defend against her for a little bit, before finally succumbing under the persistent, surprising attacks. “With a little more training in this form, you could definitely defend my attacks for much longer. How do you think it suited you? Better or worse than before?” asked the master.  
“Better, I think. I would never have been able to fend you off for that long with just one saber.”  
“Ok, now try attacking me and see if your attacks are improved too.”

Again, Kyra quickly realized that this master was not messing around. She knew what she was doing. Again, Kyra was able to get around the master’s defenses for a little at the beginning, then found every blow she attempted blocked by one of the two sabers.  
“Better or worse?” the master asked again.  
“Better,” Kyra replied.  
“Right, well, I have to go around and help some other people. Hey Ben!” she shouted across the room.  
“Yeah?” the male jedi turned away from the younglings he had been helping.  
“You want to help Kyra practice while I help some more people?”  
“Yeah, sure. That was great timing, anyway! I had just finished with these two!”  
The two jedi kept moving around, helping everyone in the group by the time the day was over. 

“Younglings!” Luke Skywalker said one last time, calling the room into order. They all turned and faced him. “Before constructing your own lightsabers as Padawans, perhaps you might want to see two more examples of real ones.” A wave of affirmation spread through the room. “Right. These two are rather unique to the Jedi who constructed them. More unique than most sabers are.” He nodded to the female Jedi, who then removed a slender metal piece from across her back. She then took two more pieces off of her belt, these two being small tubes, with a smaller tube jutting out the middle at a 90 degree angle. She clipped them on at either end of the larger piece. She thumbed two buttons on either side, and the blades activated. All six of them. Her saber was double ended, with each end having a crossguard hilt. One side was a bright, resonating blue. The other was a deep, rich red color. She held the saber loosely at her side, the blue blades facing forward. 

The younglings were surprised. Two blade colors? A Jedi with red blades? Then, the male activated his saber. They were even more surprised at his. His was a simple crossguard design, but with a ferocious red attacking blade and two purple guard blades.  
Kyra wondered for a second. The female was clearly talented with many forms of lightsaber dueling. Why would she contain herself to having a dual-bladed saber when she was clearly quite talented with all forms? And why would the male use only one saber, when two would likely work better? Then, Luke suggested they have a sample duel. The two masters nodded, and flipped a switch on their hilts. The hues of the blades changed slightly, and the noise generated by the sabers rose to a slightly higher pitch. They were on training mode. Then, the two began to spar, and Kyra’s questions were answered. The female was far more efficient with the double blade than she had been with the two sabers. It was like an extension of her own limbs, as if she had grown up using that very saber. The male moved so quickly that the younglings could barely even see the blades. Adding another saber into the mix would only endanger the master himself, as it would slow him down.

Later that day, after getting a tie in their sparring match, the two Jedi Masters were conferring, talking about the younglings. “You think they know us as people now?” asked the female jedi of her partner.  
“I sure hope so. When they find out who I am, they probably won’t be so keen on wanting to be our padawans.”  
“Don’t be so sure of that.”  
“Anyone you think would work well as my padawan?” Luke had advised them not to pick their own, but to have each of them pick the other’s padawan. After her answer, the male jedi said, “Perfect, he gets along well with who I had picked for you.”  
“Who’s that?”  
He replied, then added, “You two worked really well together today.”

The next morning, the younglings gathered again, for the last time as younglings. “Younglings, please welcome the jedi who will soon be your masters.” Luke Skywalker began to say the jedi’s names one at a time as they entered. One after another, the names all preceded by “Knight.” None of these were the masters who had come the day before. The younglings remained quiet, until, at the very end, Luke said “Masters Rey Dameron and Ben Solo.” The younglings almost instantly began talking among each other, as the two jedi from the day before entered the room.  
The younglings had all seen the numerous Holonet stories about the heroics of Rey Dameron, the Jedi who had single handedly brought down the First Order. And they had all heard the stories about Ben Solo, the Jedi who had walked the path of the dark side, been one of the main leaders of the First Order, and still toed that line between the light and dark to this day.  
No wonder Rey had seemed to be on an equal level as Grand Master Skywalker the day before! She practically was, just without the title. And her partner was Ben Solo, the dark-side driven son of the smuggler and war hero Han Solo and Grand Master Skywalker’s sister, Leia Organa? The younglings understood the strange lightsaber colors. They understood why the masters had wanted them to be known as people first, rather than as their Holonet adaptations.  
“These jedi have all told me who they chose as their padawans. None chose the same person. You have each been chosen by one of them,” Luke Skywalker said. “Some of these jedi were my padawans, at one time or another. More were padawans to the others. Even one of the two Masters we have with us was a padawan to the other, not me.”

“Kyra,” Grand Master Skywalker said, “You have been chosen by Master Dameron.” Kyra’s eyes grew wide. It was around halfway through the ceremony. Many of her friends had been chosen already. They were standing by their new masters now. With a nod of encouragement from the Jedi Master, Kyra stepped forward and took her place beside Rey. “Wedge,” Master Skywalker continued, “You have been chosen by Master Solo.” One of Wedge’s friends nudged him. “You get to be trained with Kyra,” he whispered, “Lucky. She’s the most powerful one in our group!” With an encouraging smile from Kyra, Wedge stepped up and took his place next to Ben.


End file.
